Wednesday, February 20, 2008

* While your mom is catnapping on the couch, expertly navigate the on-demand cable offerings -- the ones your parents can't figure out at all -- to call up a Martha Stewart flower-arranging special. (Trust me, though you may be only 9, you live for this stuff.) Watch the special with laser-like focus, taking notes as you go.

* Your mom is still snoring on the couch, so go out in the yard and gather up some calla lily blossoms, plus a bunch of muddy gravel and some rocks. Bundle them all up in your mom's favorite white linen tea towel and bring them inside.

* Use the kitchen strainer (you know, the one your parents drain the dinner pasta in) to rinse the mud off of the rocks and gravel. Don't worry about the extra mud and gravel all over the counter.

* Find a circular, clear-glass bowl in the kitchen cupboard. Be sure to leave the other ten bowls on the floor, in the exact spot they were when you pulled them all out in your quest to find the most perfect one.

* Put the gravel in the bowl, and fill it with water. Decide that the gravel wasn't rinsed enough, and that the water is too muddy as a result. Dump the whole thing out and start over again.

* Once you're satisfied that the water in the bowl is crystal clear, arrange the rocks in the gravel just so.

* Take a calla lily stem, bend it into a circle, and place it in the bowl so that the bloom rests above the surface of the water. Repeat with the other lilies until they form a blooming ring.

* Carry the bowl into the living room, being careful to only slosh a little bit of water out onto the floor, and find the perfect spot for it on the coffee table.

Isn't it a great moment when you see that you and your child share a similar passion. You can't teach that it only comes naturally. She sounds like she's gonna keep you busy - in a good way! Enjoy every minute of it. My beautiful daughter is heading of to design school in San Francisco next year. I'm going to be lost without her.

What a talent your daughter has! Before I read your posting I thought the arrangement in the first photo was created by you or another "grownup". It's wonderful when children find unique ways to express their unique talents! Dirty towels, kitchens, etc. are not so bad when the results are such as this.